Members spikemullings Posted October 21, 2007 Members Share Posted October 21, 2007 She would know...she invented him Well, less invented him than adeptly cobbled him together from a whole bunch of pre-existing characters and character types, I would say. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members alphajerk Posted October 21, 2007 Members Share Posted October 21, 2007 a bigger question would be why would it bother you/does it bother you if he was/is? and yes, bert and ernie were gay as can be... so is the purple teletubbie, and barney. and sherlock holmes probably was as well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members rasputin1963 Posted October 21, 2007 Members Share Posted October 21, 2007 Gay doesn't happen. It's just sin. He's got The Devil. He needs to go to church and pray. Meet a nice girl. That'll fix 'im. I guess his Dad didn't toss the football around with him in the front yard when he was growing up. That'll do it. Still, all the other Hogwarts characters need to be wary: All gay men are pedophiles, of course, and what's worse, just knowing a gay person will turn you gay. Gay men are perpetually sexually hungry, always looking out for their next victim. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members alphajerk Posted October 21, 2007 Members Share Posted October 21, 2007 honesly, i have a bigger issue with people like Sen Craig being gay than some fictional character... and the "gaydar" goes off the chart watching his interview. its not the issue of his gayness itself, its his "character". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Magpel Posted October 21, 2007 Author Members Share Posted October 21, 2007 I could give a hermaphroditic rat's ass about Albus Dumbledore's putative sexuality. All I'm saying is that it's bush--simply bush--for a writer to use the media to emend a book or even guide interpetation after publication. In fact, I don't think I've ever heard it done before. Even Steven King doesn't stoop to that... Publishing emended or restored versions is another matter altogether. For example, the "serious lit" world has been rocked recently by the attempts of Raymond Carver's widow, the novelist Tess Gallagher, to publish the original--and Carver's preferred--versions of the stories in his landmark work of minimlaist fiction, "What We Talk About When We Talk About Love." The restored stories reveal Carver to be no minimlaist at all--a rather leaden, emoitonal maximalist in fact, and the cold minimalism for which he is famous appears to be almost entirely the work of his editor Gordon Lish. Now this is big stuff, worthy of "taking it to ther people." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members slight-return Posted October 21, 2007 Members Share Posted October 21, 2007 If a tree falls in the forrest, but there's no one there to hear it, does it make a sound? I've heard an interesting analaysis No, it doesn't. It produces acoustic waves. Sound is a perceptual phenomenon, acoustic waves are a physical phenomena Yeah, it probalay comes across as a smart-ass anser, but it can have something to say about observtion, perception, and our thinking about such things and it's a smartass answer Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members alphajerk Posted October 21, 2007 Members Share Posted October 21, 2007 wouldnt it create sound pressure level changes? i mean thats what sound is. the air simply changing its pressure level. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members rasputin1963 Posted October 21, 2007 Members Share Posted October 21, 2007 I could give a hermaphroditic rat's ass about Albus Dumbledore's putative sexuality. All I'm saying is that it's bush--simply bush--for a writer to use the media to emend a book or even guide interpetation after publication. In fact, I don't think I've ever heard it done before. Even Steven King doesn't stoop to that...Publishing emended or restored versions is another matter altogether. For example, the "serious lit" world has been rocked recently by the attempts of Raymond Carver's widow, the novelist Tess Gallagher, to publish the original--and Carver's preferred--versions of the stories in his landmark work of minimlaist fiction, "What We Talk About When We Talk About Love." The restored stories reveal Carver to be no minimlaist at all--a rather leaden, emoitonal maximalist in fact, and the cold minimalism for which he is famous appears to be almost entirely the work of his editor Gordon Lish. Now this is big stuff, worthy of "taking it to ther people." I am a huge Raymond Carver fan... I've simply got to check out the restored versions of these stories... Unbelievable. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Magpel Posted October 21, 2007 Author Members Share Posted October 21, 2007 Rasputin, check your PMs Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Lee Flier Posted October 21, 2007 Members Share Posted October 21, 2007 a bigger question would be why would it bother you/does it bother you if he was/is? It's not the gayness that bothers me, it's the insistence on sexualizing everything all the time. Like your sentence below. I don't give a crap whether the purple teletubby is "gay," the kids who watch the show aren't thinking about whether they're "gay" or "straight" or them having sex at all. It'd be the same if a lot of emphasis was being placed on their being heterosexual, it would still bug me. and yes, bert and ernie were gay as can be... so is the purple teletubbie, and barney. and sherlock holmes probably was as well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Geoff Grace Posted October 21, 2007 Members Share Posted October 21, 2007 If a tree falls in the forrest Oops! That should be "forest." Best, Geoff Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Prog Posted October 21, 2007 Members Share Posted October 21, 2007 I mean, not that it matters in the least. It's kinda cool. "Kinda cool"? I guess if gay boys is "kinda cool" for you, there is media out there for you. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Magpel Posted October 21, 2007 Author Members Share Posted October 21, 2007 "Kinda cool"? I guess if gay boys is "kinda cool" for you, there is media out there for you. Smart! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Geoff Grace Posted October 21, 2007 Members Share Posted October 21, 2007 I think it's important to make a distinction between love and sex. I agree that children are often inappropriately exposed at too early of an age by the media to sensationalistic images and stories about sex. On the other hand, I don't think it harms children to know that their parents love each other -- regardless of whether those parents happen to be of the opposite sex or of the same sex. Edit: I should add that I don't think the Albus Dumbledore back story is specifically about sex or love. But then, I'm not sure it's about anything in particular. Best, Geoff Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members alphajerk Posted October 21, 2007 Members Share Posted October 21, 2007 It's not the gayness that bothers me, it's the insistence on sexualizing everything all the time. Like your sentence below. I don't give a crap whether the purple teletubby is "gay," the kids who watch the show aren't thinking about whether they're "gay" or "straight" or them having sex at all. It'd be the same if a lot of emphasis was being placed on their being heterosexual, it would still bug me. that would just mean they are still in the closet... kinda like tom cruise [still in], ellen degeneres [now out], senator craig [in the stall] and so on... if the author wants to provide more information about the character and claims he is gay, so what? didnt change what i thought of the character or how i perceived him. malfoy and crabbe and goyle were all gay too. malfoy will be caught in a mens restroom stall later on in life. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Super 8 Posted October 22, 2007 Members Share Posted October 22, 2007 I agree with Lee. Everything gets sexualized. Kids don't need it. I'm not sure why adults do it unless it's to piss each other off over something. In this case to piss off the religious right. Same goes for people like James Dobson claiming Tinky-Winky is gay for carrying a purse. How much more asexual could the Teletubbies be??? I don't even know how they use the bathroom! I believe it was another religious hate monger who said Bert and Ernie were gay.It's stupid. People just like to be provocative. Kid's certainly don't need it. They are going to have plenty of issues to deal with as they get older regardless of their orientation. Why bother them with this? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Jeff da Weasel Posted October 22, 2007 Members Share Posted October 22, 2007 Why is this "bothering" young kids at all? It's not in the book. Unless the parent brings it up, I can't see it being much of an issue. Apparently, based on the reactions here and elsewhere, it is an issue for grown-ups, though. I'll stand by the fact that an author (or songwriter, or any creative person) has the right to do whatever the hell they want with the worlds they make. People don't have to like it, but the creative person can take that risk. I doubt Rowling is concerned with her future popularity as an author. She's extraordinarily wealthy already, and anything she writes in the future is a guaranteed best-seller out of the chute. The people who are most offended by this revelation aren't her customers anyway. I don't think she needed to be silent about this. Keeping poor Albus in the closet sends a bad message. Think about that for awhile. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members alphajerk Posted October 22, 2007 Members Share Posted October 22, 2007 um, kids bring it up... i had to explain "gay" to my 7yo already, although it came from the schoolyard and not from tv. its funny, i already see the kids who are going to be gay at such a young age. you can almost bet on it with 100% certainty. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Jeff da Weasel Posted October 22, 2007 Members Share Posted October 22, 2007 um, kids bring it up... i had to explain "gay" to my 7yo already, although it came from the schoolyard and not from tv. Sure. So let's not blame things like Harry Potter for it. its funny, i already see the kids who are going to be gay at such a young age. you can almost bet on it with 100% certainty. Well, then you probably believe in what many scientists are finding proof of now: that sexual preference and gender identification are as much (if not more) a matter of genetic encoding as they are from environment. Nature over nurture seems to be the current path in this regard. I see nothing wrong with having to explain it to your kids who are curious, other than the discomfort of the parent having to deal with the conversation. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Lee Flier Posted October 22, 2007 Members Share Posted October 22, 2007 Sure, you have to explain sexuality to your kids at a young age, and their preferences are determined at a young age, and there's nothing wrong with any of that. That isn't my point at all. My point is that we don't need to look at everything under the sun in terms of sexuality. People bring it up in a context where it really isn't relevant, and it sounds contrived and lame. I get this mental picture of Beavis and Butt-head sitting around the TV watching Sesame Street, snickering "Uhhhhuhuhuhuh... Bert and Ernie are HOMOS!!" It has absolutely nothing to do with the sketches and in all the years I watched Sesame Street, it never once occurred to me to think about Bert or Ernie's sexual orientation one way or another. Even though I was aware of the birds and the bees at a young age, including homosexuality. Again let's just remove the "gay" part of it altogether. Imagine you've read a book about a guy who was stuck on a desert island. He's alone the whole time, and the story is mainly concerned with what he does to survive and how he feels about it. It doesn't mention anything about the guy's personal life at all and that isn't necessary to the story. Then you read an interview with the author later and the author says, "Hey guess what! That character is STRAIGHT!!! He's HETERO!!! WHOAAA!!" I think most of us would go... wtf. Like that has anything to do with anything. The only reason to bring it up would be if you want to make the character arbitrarily gay because you think that's going to piss people off or offend them... or else if you yourself are pretty immature and think it's cute to make everything have something to do with sex. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Jeff da Weasel Posted October 22, 2007 Members Share Posted October 22, 2007 Sure, you have to explain sexuality to your kids at a young age, and their preferences are determined at a young age, and there's nothing wrong with any of that. That isn't my point at all. My point is that we don't need to look at everything under the sun in terms of sexuality. I agree with you completely. I don't see that it adds to the story at all to say Dumbledore was gay. But if that's what Rowling had in mind the whole time and was responding to a question about his love interest, would you have preferred that she lied to the audience? My opinion is that had she lied about it, she'd be by proxy insinuating that his being gay was something embarrassing or wrong, which I don't believe it is. Finally, a person's sexual orientation goes far beyond sex. It is about love and romance as well. It's not always a matter of "sexualizing", but more often contextualizing the character and his/her relationships. Again, if Rowling was responding to a question about the character's love interest (which she was) and clarified his sexual orientation to put it in the proper perspective (which she did), I'm having trouble seeing anything wrong with that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Lee Flier Posted October 22, 2007 Members Share Posted October 22, 2007 Finally, a person's sexual orientation goes far beyond sex. It is about love and romance as well. It's not always a matter of "sexualizing", but more often contextualizing the character and his/her relationships. Again, if Rowling was responding to a question about the character's love interest (which she was) and clarified his sexual orientation to put it in the proper perspective (which she did), I'm having trouble seeing anything wrong with that. I don't see anything wrong with that. I didn't know that was the context. If she'd just said it out of left field in a press release or something that would be a different story, but if she was directly answering somebody's question about his romantic interest, then I don't see a problem with it and no, she shouldn't lie if that's what she had in mind. Of course, that brings up the larger issue of having romantic interests without their being sexual... which used to be socially accepted and still is in some parts of the world, including between heterosexuals with people of the same sex and vice versa... but that's a whole other can of worms. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members EvilTwin Posted October 22, 2007 Members Share Posted October 22, 2007 There was a thread on this over in PP, too. It's really something when a deceased fictional character is "outed" and it's news. I think it honestly does add to his character...but I don't think Rowling was too smart for announcing this sort of thing after the books were all released. As a reader, you like to think that you get to know the characters you're reading about. When an author tells you something significant like this out of the text...it kinda cheapens reading through seven large books, IMO. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members angstwulf Posted October 22, 2007 Members Share Posted October 22, 2007 Lee: I think context is important, as you have pointed out. When in the olden days a children's story mentioned that two characters were husband and wife and had a child nothing was said about sexuality. I hope that continues. I also hope that the mention of a person's sexuality can be taken in a similar matter and I think that's what Rowling was trying to do to some degree. Whether or not this can be taken merely as part of our insight into the writer's process or if we are going to point and grimace may have more to say about our level of maturity than her reasons for stating so. Love is an important emotion and what mommy and daddy/daddy and daddy/mommy and mommy do about it behind closed doors is personal stuff, innit? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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